First week of PT: working on mechanics

So I’ve met with the PT twice so far, and it appears that something is off/painful with my groin (more like my adductor magnus, not necessarily my pectineus, perhaps bobby helped fix that), my rectus femoris, and my good ol’ psoas. Mike did some graston on my groin, felt strange because it made me feel the layer of facia under the skin and how bumpy it was.  Now I have some pretty bruises where he worked it, but that area of my leg is feeling better. He said I could try the leg press, but if it bothered my groin I should abstain.  I tried it with like 50#, but I experienced pain in my rectus femoris area. Technically, since that wasn’t my groin I could keep going and not go against the letter of what he said, but I decided to shut it down anyway because I’m sure he meant if it caused pain don’t do it.

The PT is having me do postural restoration, at least that’s what  I think it’s called.  It consists of various, albeit strange, exercises that force me to use the muscles that I tend to ignore (like the glutes) and shut off the muscles that I tend to use (like the groin).  Through the various stretches and exercises it seems that I needed to keep doing my favorite Kstar Mwod, because when I try to put my femur into the back of the acetabular socket I feel all kinds of stretching on my right side. The PT thinks that if we can fix this, everything else will fall in to place.  I makes sense, the tight hip capsules, FAI, torn labrum, pulled groin, they all stem from something, and I think my mechanics are a big factor.

I should also mention that I have not felt my hip catch at all since December. I haven’t really pushed it but I’m not trying to flex the hip more when I do things like tie my shoes, and so far nothing out of the ordinary has happened. I think it’s good enough for me.

So in summation since the Graston my groin has been pretty much pain free, I think (it’s hard to locate hip pain sometimes), but I am still feeling pain in my hip from the psoas and the rectus femoris. Perhaps a Graston session will help with that as well.  Also, I am starting to notice engaging my abs more in everyday life, hopefully from the exercises I am doing from physical therapy.